Indian Summer
by Ravenwisker
Summary: “How long will you be staying on our ranch with us Mr. Bespoke?” She asked, setting her glass down. “Just for this summer. It’s a vacation if you will.” He replied. Slight OC/Ghastly Some Spanish, most is translated. T for some language
1. Vacation

**A/n~ This one's been sitting in my head for a while, and I finally got it all down on paper (er, well... Word). Thank you NerdySkeleton for Beta-reading this chapter. GO READ HER STORIES NOW, THEY ROCK. =3 Anywho, I apolagise ahead of time for any Oocness with Ghastly. He's not exactly the easiest nut to crack if you know what I mean. As always, read, enjoy and review, for reviews are love~**

**I DO NOT OWN GHASTLY OR SKULDUGGERY PLEASANT, HOWEVER, MITENA AND ALL OTHER CHARACTERS NOT IN THE ORIGINAL SERIES ARE MINE.**

**~Raven**

* * *

~6/4/ 2004~

A Grey horse trotted through a wide expanse of open pasture, with a smiling rider on its bareback, improving her skill. She wore a grey tank-top and jeans as well as a pair of riding boots. She dug her left foot into the hoses side a little and it turned, just as she wanted it._ "Buena!"_ she said, laughing in delight that she had gotten the horse to slow and stop. She patted its neck and got off the mares back. "_Buena_, Typhoon!" The Spanish word rolled off her tongue as she kissed the snout of the gray horse. She looked up as she heard a car pull up the long dusty driveway to their small, south-Texas ranch.

She lived here with her brother and father after moving from Mexico. Originally, she and her twin brother had grown up there, near the Yucatan. Her brother and her, as well as her family on her mother's side were part of a race as old as time itself, the Ancients. They weren't the Ancients she had once heard of after moving to the U.S. though. The ones she was told about worshiped dark gods. Her people followed one Great Spirit. They were a deeper society of the Maya, yet unknown to the outside world.

Her people followed one Great Spirit as opposed to many, and the beings that the other tribes of the Maya worshiped, were ancient and unknown creatures that were summoned by her and the other Shadow Wielders, or necromancers as they were called today.

She decided to take the horse back to the stable, and to greet her father. She splayed her hands beneath her, pushing herself a foot off of the ground and helping her get back onto Typhoon. She made a clicking noise after grabbing a small bit of the mare's mane, and trotted back to the stable.

After returning the grey horse to her stall, the girl pulled the ponytail holder out of her just barely shoulder length brunet hair. A black ink-blot like tattoo was on her left check. In fact, most of her left side was covered in many different patterns of black markings, all naturally occurring for mages like her and her people.

The car shut off and the driver got out, and then an unexpected sound, a second car door opening and closing. She ran to meet her father, who though well over one hundred and fifty, looked as young and handsome as any man. He was born in Texas and met his wife when she was on a trip to speak with the sanctuary of Texas. She went back to Mexico pregnant and married a year later, and had two children, a boy and a girl. Her husband, Marcus Hereford had come after the children were eighteen, to see them. Unfortunately, she died a week later. So Marcus brought the kids back and learned their Chosen names for the first time, his daughter, Mitena Nocturne and his son, Gavin Cheveyo.

Mitena approached her father, smiling up at him with her bright deep purple eyes. "How was Typhoon for you today? That was who you were riding out there, right?" he chuckled.

She nodded. "I took her out bareback and trotted her. She was great!" She looked at the man next to her father. He had deep scars covering all of his face, and he had no hair that Mitena could see, as he was wearing a brown fedora. He didn't notice her at first because he was taking in the landscape, eventually watching two of their horses gallop through the pasture. "Who's this?" She asked, making him turn to face her. He looked at her intently while she smiled politely.

"This is Ghastly Bespoke; he's someone I met when I was in Ireland for business. We became good friends and he's over here visiting." he said, beckoning for the scarred man to come over. "Ghastly, this is Mitena Nocturne, my daughter."

Ghastly held out his hand and Mitena took it, "If you'll need anything, you may ask me or my brother for it. We would be happy to do it for you as our guest." She spoke sweetly, "Mr. Bespoke, let's go inside. It's much cooler than out here in the sun, I put a fresh pitcher of mint tea in the fridge." She turned to her father, "Dad, I think Ender is about to throw his left back shoe. Can you go check him out? "

Marcus sighed, "Damn stallion's thrown a shoe twice this year and it's only June." He looked to Ghastly. "I'll be there in a second, I got to go check Ender out then call someone to get him re-shoed if he needs it."

He walked off and Mitena looked to Ghastly, "Shall we go in?" He simply nodded and followed her back to the old stone farmhouse. She opened the storm door for him and allowed him inside, gesturing him to the table. As he sat, she removed the clear pitcher from the refrigerator and poured two tall glasses of sweet mint tea.

She handed one to Ghastly, who eagerly gulped down half of the glass. "That's delicious, did you use tea bags?"

She smiled and shook her head. "Nope, it's fresh mint from out back and honey bought from one of our neighbor's bee keeps. We try to keep things like this as close to home as possible." She paused, "If you don't mind me asking, were you in an accident?"

He let out a light laugh, "That's a new one. No, I was jinxed before I was born. Now if you don't mind me asking, what are those marks from?"

She looked away, "They're charms bestowed at birth. They show both the side of dominance, like left or right handed, and in some cases type of magic."

"And what type would that be?"

She looked back to him. "Elemental magic, I'm one of the few of my people able to use it. But, it's not all I practice… Our chief found out I was a necromancer and instantly changed my training from Healer to Priestess. I trained for about two years then I left to live here with my father. But he's told you about that by now I imagine, why I don't go off to live on my own."

Ghastly looked at her intently, "I can understand why. You have quite a few horses. How many do you have?"

Mitena looked up at the ceiling, counting in her head. "Well, let's see… we've got four mares; Lea, Typhoon, Eagle, and Fleck, two geldings; Thunder and Blaze, two stallions; Poison and Ender, and two very unique siblings, Apple and Blizzard."

The scarred man looked at her. "How?" He asked, draining the last of his beverage.

Mitena looked at him and smiled again, "We call them _los __caballos de Mercurio_, Mercury horses in English. Would you like to see why?"

Ghastly shrugged, "Sure, I'll be here for a while, I might as well start sight-seeing now."

"How long will you be staying with us Mr. Bespoke?" She asked, setting her glass down.

"Just for this summer. It's a vacation if you will."

"This is a beautiful place to come for a vacation, I hope you enjoy it. You can head out awhile if you like. I just need to get something," She said, walking into the living-room for a second and returning as Ghastly had his hand on the door, preparing to go out but he stopped. Around Mitena's neck was small, red and gold, snake-like creature. It looked up at him from its human perch and screeched at him, spreading two red and gold feathered wings. "Shush Tulum; he is a friend, a guest." Mitena cooed, stroking its head.

"What _is _that?" the tailor asked, looking very confused.

Mitena laughed a little. "This is Tulum, my Quetzalcoatl. He is the baby of a creature that I summoned, his mother."

Ghastly just nodded a little, opening the door and heading back out into the sun. The air was somewhat dry for June, and the mid-afternoon sun still burned brightly. Mitena took the lead to the stable, Tulum basking happily on her shoulders in the sun. Once in the cool stables, Tulum left his masters comfort, flapping off back outside to rest in the early summer warmth.

Mitena's father was inspecting the hoof of a black horse that Ghastly suspected to be Ender, but Mitena was at the end of the stable. A whinny came from the stall that she was opening, pulling on the halter of a brown headed appaloosa. But Ghastly looked in awe as the horse stretched out two white and brown wings as it was pulled out of the stall. The wings were perfectly positioned on the horse so that they allowed both flight and a rider. It folded its wings together again and nudged Mitena's side with its snout. It made a sort of grunting noise, causing the young mage to pull out a few white cubes from her pants pocket that the mare nibbled down.

Ghastly was even more confused now. Marcus had never told him about these creatures, and even though he knew that almost anything was possible for a mage of the right amount of skill, how on earth did he come across a spell for this?!

He stepped a bit closer, wary that the creature was slightly taller than him. He held out his hand, and in turn, the mare nudged it, as if asking for food.

Mitena giggled a little, stroking the horse's mane. "Ghastly, this is Apple, Apple, this is Ghastly."

As if the mare understood, It bowed. Ghastly's eyes widened, "Impressive, though it looks like a Pegasus. How exactly did you come across it?" He asked as Apple stood back up.

"A spell was cast on them by me just after we learned that their mother was pregnant. They are different from a Pegasus in some ways. They can understand the one who bestows the spell, and reach speeds of around eighty miles an hour when flying, hence 'Mercury.'" She answered, walking Apple back into her stall.

Ghastly wondered what riding such a horse would be like. "Have you ridden her at that speed? Flying and running?" he asked.

She nodded, "It takes much discipline and hard work, but yes, after a while I learned to ride her at those speeds." She hesitated, "Would you like to learn?"

Ghastly smiled for his first time since arrival and seeing the horses. "I'd love to."


	2. Apples

**A/n: Yay, second chapter! I understand some of you may be like: _Is she really writing about this? WHO CARES?!_ Its just a bit of an explination story to another story that I have in mind, so don't worry, not all my stories will be westernish. PLEASE REVIEW!! And thank you to those who did. ^^ Al always, read enjoy and review.**

**Disclaimer in chapter one.**

**~Raven**

* * *

That night, after a filling dinner and chat around the table, Mitena showed Ghastly to his room. He had only brought two bags with him, but they were good sized. She led him into the living area and up the old and creaking stairs. Several pictures of horses and country singers lined the hall that she turned into, immediately taking a left into a nice sized bedroom with a queen sized bed pushed up against the wall and facing a window, allowing the user of the bed to see out over the pasture.

"Welcome to your temporary home, Mr. Bespoke." she said, smiling and setting down his bags on the bed.

"Please, call me Ghastly." he smiled back; looking around the room, there was a wardrobe to the left next to a white wooden door. "What's in there?" he asked, pointing to it.

She pressed the old-fashioned handle and allowed the door to swing open. She allowed him in first, and he marveled at the difference in size. This room was only about six wide by twelve feet long, and yet there was a small bed and wardrobe the right hand corners of the room. Pictures of the horses on the ranch as well as others were posted around the room and on a cork board directly in front of them were about fifteen different colored ribbons, eight of them a royal blue.

Gazing at the awards he asked; "Is this your room?" she nodded.

"What are these all for?" he pointed to the blue ones.

Mitena looked away, a little embarrassed. "Barrel racing mostly," she said, moving next to him and pointing to the three in the middle. "These are for bull riding though, but that was about ten years ago, when we still had our bull, Torrent." She turned back to him, changing the subject. "I hope you don't mind our rooms are connected. It's a small house, and the only rooms that aren't connected are my brothers and fathers."

He shook his head, "It's not a problem." He looked at his watch, the time showed at about quarter after eight, and outside a half moon peered in through the window in Mitena's room.

She sighed, "It's getting late and we have an early start tomorrow. You should get some sleep. There's an alarm clock on the top of the night stand on the far side of the bed. If you can, set it for whatever time you need so that you have enough time to have woken up, gotten dressed and eaten breakfast by six thirty so we can get out feed." he nodded and went back into what was now his room.

"Where is the bathroom?" he asked, moving to his bags and pulling out a toothbrush and tube of toothpaste. Mitena walked into the hall and turned left, stopping at the end of the hall where there was a closed door in front of her and to her left and right. She tuned to him and pointed to the door that was on his right. "This is Gavin's room," she pointed at the door at the end of the hall, "this is Marcus's room," and she opened the remaining door, revealing the bathroom, "and here is the bathroom."

"Thanks." He said as she smiled and walked past him. His eyes followed her down the hall before he moved into the bathroom. It was small, with a newer glass-box stand-up shower in the corner. He moved to the sink and brushed his teeth, thinking about what was in store for tomorrow. He had never ridden a horse before and something told him it would take a while for him to get to the same level or even close to the same level as Mitena. He finished, gathering his things and moving back into the other room. He dug through his bag and found his sleeping pants, closed the door then changed into them. A knock on the door startled him, and he pushed it open slowly.

Mitena stood before him, dressed in her sleeping garb; a purple sleeveless shirt and purple woman's boxers. Her face flushed pink a little as she looked away from him, scurrying into her room and before closing the door, muttering, "Goodnight."

"Goodnight." He muttered back, moving to the alarm clock and setting it to go off at five thirty. He closed the door to the hallway and turned off the light before crawling into bed to attempt sleep.

~X~

Ghastly awoke to the soft beeping of the alarm, and as he reached over and turned it off, he became conscious of the weight on his lower legs. He propped himself up and laughed as Tulum looked up at him from his legs with a sleepy face. The serpent shook its head, causing the green feathers on the back of his head to shake wildly. It stuck its tongue out at Ghastly and then slithered off the bed into Mitena's open room.

Ghastly pushed himself off the bed, bringing one of his bags off of the floor and removing a pair of jeans and a gray t-shirt from it from it. He changed, wishing that he could be in one of his suits, but Marcus had advised him that the West was no place for business men.

So at about six, he walked down the stairs to see a plate of waffles positioned in the middle of the table next to a bottle of syrup. Mitena looked up from her own plate, which had a few remaining pieces of two waffles lightly coated in syrup. She smiled as he entered, pulling out the chair across from her and sitting down.

"_Buenos dias! _Good morning Ghastly, did you sleep well?" she asked, taking an apple from a fruit dish at the far end of the table and setting it next to her plate.

"Good, actually, Tulum must have wandered in some time last night; he was on my feet this morning." He replied, forking a waffle onto his plate and buttering it.

Mitena chuckled, "He does that, he's like a scaly cat."

When he finished, Mitena took their dishes to the sink, rinsing off the plates then putting the extra food away. She grabbed the apple before heading outside.

They both left out the kitchen door, Ghastly with his hat on and Mitena with her hair pulled into a pony-tail again. The sun was already slightly above the horizon as they crossed the dirt drive-way to the weathered stable. Whinny's echoed throughout the twelve-stalled corridor, and Mitena explained that her father and brother brought all the horses in the night before.

She stopped at the end of the corridor, where she opened up a big sliding door, allowing a cool morning breeze the play with the loose bits of hay on the ground in front of both the door and several large stacks of hay.

A small bag hung from a nail on the side of the small hay loft, and Mitena removed it. She opened the bag and pulled out a small pocket knife, replacing the still open bag back on the nail. Unfolding the knife, she cut the two strings that bound the hay together and tossed them aside. After refolding the knife and placing it in her pocket, she turned to face Ghastly.

"Each horse gets about three pounds of hay now and three tonight. They'll eat their lunch in the pasture. Then they get two scoopfuls of grain- seven and a half pounds." She explained. Ghastly nodded and pointed to the apple she set down on a different bale. "Who's that for?" he asked.

She picked it up and tossed it to him. "For the time you're here, you'll train with two horses; the horse you choose now, then Blizzard. When you choose the horse you wish to train with, give them that apple, as a sign of trust. You can do that now if you'd like, I'll get started feeding."

He smiled, "Alright."

"Oh, and I suggest not taking Poison or Ender. Stallions are definitely not beginner horses." She called after him as he began browsing the stalls.

"Got it." He called back, looking at the sir name plates on the horse's stalls. Along his right were Apple, Ender, Thunder, Eagle and Lea. He turned around at the end, looking at the name plates again. Typhoon, Fleck, Blaze, Poison, and Blizzard. He went back to Fleck, Inspecting the mare between the bars of her stalls door and wall. She turned to face him, looking at him with big brown eyes.

The brown paint horse had a white stripe on its face and was covered with splotches and splatters of white. She gave a low, almost purring sound with her ears turned towards him, and he smiled. Slowly, he reached the hand without the apple through the bars, and the mare lowered its head a little, allowing him to pet her nose.

Mitena came down to him with a bale of hay in her arms. "Good choice, she seems to like you already." She said, setting down the bale and cutting the straps. She took the halter and lead rope that were hanging with the horses reins on a peg beneath its nameplate. She opened the door to Fleck's stall, closing it slightly behind her before pulling the halter over Flecks head and tying the lead rope to one of the bars on the wall. She opened the door again and moved to the hay bale, separating a few subsections from the bale. "Put that apple down for a second and take this in to Fleck." She said.

Ghastly did as he was told, putting the apple on the ground and taking the hay. Cautiously, he entered the stall. Fleck raised her head to look at him and swiveled her ears forward. He placed the hay in the blue plastic bucket in front of her and she graciously began eating. He smiled a little then walked back out. Mitena returned from Eagle's stall, who was also eating happily.

"Will you choose her?" She asked a smile on her face as she picked the apple up off the ground.

He nodded. "I will, she seems like a great horse. Do I just give her the apple?"

Mitena shook her head. "These horses have been raised in a way that they will trust those who say and do certain thing. It's something that my brother and I remember from our tribe. If you wish to train with her you must repeat what I say then give her the apple. Still want to do it?"

Ghastly paused, then nodded again, taking the apple then moving back into the stall.

"Since I have said this to her already, she will ignore me. But once you begin, she will stop eating to listen. I'll translate what to say, but you must say it in Spanish, she doesn't recognize it in any other way. Now repeat_: __Caballo, su majestad y la belleza son igualadas por ningún otro animal."_

_(Horse, your majesty and beauty are matched by no other animal.)_

Ghastly repeated it, with some trouble, but Fleck still looked up.

Mitena continued, _"Un vínculo de confianza entre nosotros nos beneficiaría a ambos en gran medida."_

_(__A bond of trust between us would benefit us both greatly.)_

As Ghastly repeated, Fleck cocked her head a little.

"_Soy un estudiante, y desea entrenar con usted. Usted puede aceptar o no.__" _

_(I am a student, and wish to train with you. You may decline or accept.)_

After Ghastly was done, Fleck straightened her head then shook it up and down, causing the chain on her lead rope to jingle.

Mitena laughed. "She has accepted! Now, tell her this: _Gracias, Espíritu amable. Voy a cuidar de ti y te tratan con mucho respeto_."

_(Thank you, kind spirit. I will care for you and treat you with much respect.)_

Ghastly repeated it, then handed the horse the apple. She took it and devoured it. She took a step towards Ghastly, and nudged his chest. He laughed and patted Fleck's muzzle. He left the stall and looked to Mitena, who was smiling widely. "You did great! When we're done feeding, she'll be happy to let you ride her."


End file.
